Starting a worm composting bin

Energy & Sustainability
Starting a worm composting bin
tremayneWorms.jpg

Next door, on our sister site CRAFT, Wendy Tremayne has an excellent piece on worm-bin composting. I’ve had a compost pile since I was a teen. It’s almost something of a religious experience for me (United Church of Compost?), certainly something that gets me up close and personal with natural life cycles I might otherwise overlook. And I’ve never gotten over the aerobic decompositional thrills of putting a huge amount of stinky, gooey garbage and yard waste in the top of the bin and shoveling out uniform, rich, black compost out of the bottom. It’s a fundamentally satisfying process somehow.

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6. Feed your worms. Bury your kitchen scraps under a couple inches of bedding to avoid inviting fruit flies. A pound of worms will decompose up to half a pound a day of your fruit and vegetable scraps, tea, and coffee. Avoid animal products and oily foods that encourage odors and pests.


How-To: Make a Worm Composting Bin

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11 thoughts on “Starting a worm composting bin

  1. Huntington says:

    I made one of these last week. My worms are happily eating away. Worm farming for life.

  2. Wilson says:

    Worms like it dark – use an opaque bin or wrap it in aluminum foil. Happy worm-farming!

  3. Michael Fusion says:

    i’m just wondering what this was doing in Craft:blog instead of Make:blog.

    not that it isn’t great, it’s just not CRAFTY

  4. AxsDeny says:

    I have one of these that I made about 2 years ago. The worms are THRIVING. Check out my Flickr set from the last time I emptied the bin.

    http://www.flickr.com/photos/axsdeny/tags/vermicomposting/

  5. Garrick says:

    Hey! Nice article. I recently made a worm bin, and now, it’s been thriving for 2 months. A bunch of little organisms have appeared, and the worms seem to be happy and are eating a lot. Check out the bin!

    http://grr-uh-rick.tumblr.com/post/133832681

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Gareth Branwyn is a freelance writer and the former Editorial Director of Maker Media. He is the author or editor of over a dozen books on technology, DIY, and geek culture. He is currently a contributor to Boing Boing, Wink Books, and Wink Fun. His free weekly-ish maker tips newsletter can be found at garstipsandtools.com.

View more articles by Gareth Branwyn

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